Review ailoutwar 1/5 · Jan 2, 2016
15 years and near zero improvements over original X-Com
I was a huge fan of X-Com Apocalypse, the third - and only real-time - installment in the franchise. With 10 years between that and this, I jumped on board and bought it in 2007. Unfortunately, this was not an advancement in any way - instead, it was a re-skinned version of the original X-COM UFO Defense/Enemy Unknown. Turn based, …
I was a huge fan of X-Com Apocalypse, the third - and only real-time - installment in the franchise. With 10 years between that and this, I jumped on board and bought it in 2007. Unfortunately, this was not an advancement in any way - instead, it was a re-skinned version of the original X-COM UFO Defense/Enemy Unknown. Turn based, unforgiving, basic, and silly.
I was aware this was based on the first X-Com game…I simply assumed there would be some gameplay improvements over the original, since it had been about 15 years. If people just wanted to play the original game, they could certainly obtain an old copy. This simply took the graphics from 1992 to 2002-ish.
I think it is sad that they did not improve upon the original or add extra functionality. Instead, this looked like a simple niche marketing cash grab. Luckily Julian Gollop is developing interesting things, and a new X-COM title hit in 2012 that was a worthy successor. Either is more worth your time and dollar, as is 1997's X-COM: Apocalypse, which was far-reaching and very in-depth for its time.